Abstract

Given that technology and innovation are rapidly rising the last few decades at excessively high rates, people tend to become more creative, searching for new ideas that, through their entrepreneurial spirit, transform into businesses, known as startups. This process of transforming an idea into an actual business that becomes productive and profitable sets the basis for entrepreneurship. Being interested in startups and the idea of creating an enterprise from scratch, I decided for my senior project to focus on these new well-known enterprises and, more specifically to zoom in on the startup ecosystem of Greece, which seems to have great potential for economic growth for the country but also faces a significant number of challenges, nowadays. This project aims to present the structure of the Greek startup ecosystem, the importance that it has for the Greek economy, as well as the most important challenges that startups face in the market. Through the conduction of a questionnaire and recorded interviews I was able to validate the odds that entrepreneurs have to face in Greece and separate them into four different aspects: 1) Regulatory Framework / Bureaucracy, 2) Government Involvement and Provision of Appropriate Incentives, 3) Taxation, 4) Team Development and Performance. I hope that this research will contribute to highlighting the importance and the potential of the Greek startup ecosystem, thus sending a message to the Greek government to redefine some of the measures that currently harming the startups, and provide the right incentives for them with the ultimate goal of creating a startup ‘nation’.